by C. K. Brooke
To her pleasure, the man had seemed drawn to her, too. Those brooding eyes had followed her all through the ballroom, until he’d finally asked her to dance. For nearly a year thereafter, Lucie had been sneaking from Backshore’s manor to the other side of the lake for many a memorable tryst with the prince.
Presently, her fine slippers connected with the ground floor. The young woman tossed her hair behind her shoulders and stepped outside to the roundabout, where her father’s carriage was parked, coachman at the ready. “Evening, Lu,” the baron greeted her as she hoisted herself inside. He sounded unusually energetic.
Lucie eyed the six snorting horses that anticipated the coachman’s command. “The whole ensemble?” She arched an eyebrow. “Surely, we don’t need a half-dozen horses to carry us less than a mile?”
“Ceremony, daughter,” replied her father. “Although, I do not doubt you’d know your way to the Straussens’ castle on foot.”
Lucie held rigid in her seat as the horses commenced in a trot. Did her father mean something significant by the statement? What—and how—could he possibly know? But when she dared glance over at him, he was already lost in thought, watching the scenery pass outside the window. Lucie exhaled, relaxing against the bench. She was being paranoid.
The ride was over in a matter of minutes, and they halted before the welcoming limestone castle. Turrets unfolded from each wing, and arranged on the sprawling back lawn were long tables, countless chairs, and a hundred hanging lanterns to greet the dusk.
Lucie walked slowly at her father’s side, bored by the faces both new and familiar that eyed her with interest. She was accustomed to the stares. While her mother, the late baroness, had been a thoroughbred Tybirian with skin as pink as a summer’s peach, Lucie had inherited her father’s darker complexion. As ambassadors, his parents had emigrated from Heppestoni, a land to the west.
Guests poured in from every direction as she was guided to a chair. She rolled her eyes at the other young ladies with their hair coiffed and garnished with fresh flowers, figures draped in expensive garments and flashy jewels, as though each was certain that the party was held just for her. In truth, no one but the parents of the spouses-to-be knew the identity of the Crown Prince’s bride, to be announced after the meal. And every young woman who’d been invited was hopeful for her own prospects, except Lucie.
She had no part in this game. Resigned, she took the seat adjacent to her father’s and spread a white linen napkin over her lap. The harpers played, the jester teased and the king’s announcer made extensive introductions. Lucie yawned as servants brought out the dinner courses, one by one, and she ignored the excited blather around her. Yet, all the while, she couldn’t help but scan the crowd for Geo. She dreaded, yet simultaneously prayed, to spot the man. After all, she hadn’t seen him since….
Her insides jolted as she caught a glimpse of the younger prince standing near the head table, where his family was seated. He was grinning, engaged in conversation with a circle of knights. He was popular among them, Lucie knew. A fine warrior himself.
He then turned his head, glancing into the crowd, and Lucie immediately lowered her gaze. Her heart skidded. What was she was playing at? If she caught his eye, what would it accomplish? Cause the prince to simply hate her more? Or tempt them both to perpetuate an affair that would only become more dangerous, the closer she approached her wedding day?
At last, the guests hushed as the announcer stood to his stocky feet at the onset of the dessert course. A pair of sisters across from Lucie gripped hands beneath the tablecloth. The announcer launched into a grand preamble on the significance of the event, the impending moment about to sweep the land of Tybiria and change one woman’s destiny forever.
Lucie plunked a grape into her wine, muttering, “Oh, get on with it.” Her father shot her a startled look.
“And now, Her Royal Majesty, our beloved Queen Emaxandra, shall come forth to reveal the identity of her lawful daughter-to-be.”
The lawn fell silent as the Queen of Tybiria, Lady Emaxandra Straussen, made her graceful way to the front of the gathering. Everyone stood and bowed. She graciously entreated them to resume their seats, and Lucie sat, stealing another glimpse at the head table. Geo remained standing among the knights, watching his mother with polite interest.
Lucie’s eyes then panned over to the Crown Prince Dmitri. She pursed her lips. Even for a ceremony of this gravity, the man could not remove his clunky spectacles? Surely, someone needed to inform the poor fellow how awkward and unbecoming they appeared on him. She surveyed him a moment more, registering the anticipation in his magnified blue eyes and the anxious gulp of his Adam’s apple, before returning her focus to the queen.
“What a splendid tradition to celebrate with you this evening.” The regal woman smiled. “I daresay, it recalls to me the king’s own Reveal Banquet, when I was chosen among my peers.”
Several seats down, a girl clutched her mother’s arm. The ladies behind Lucie appeared to be praying.
“And so, with great joy, I announce the engagement of my eldest son,” the queen drew a breath, and her audience held theirs, “to Miss Luccia Camerlane of Backshore.”
Silence.
Lucie blinked, staring at the untouched petit-fours on her porcelain plate. A symphony of applause built among the guests. The lanterns around her blurred, while the clapping sounded brassy and distant, as though reaching her ears from the opposite end of a tunnel. In disbelief, she looked up at her father.
“Go on,” he grinned.
Unsteady, Lucie rose, wondering how she would manage to walk while her legs felt like the contents of a jar of preserves. She tried not to notice the defeated frowns of the other girls, their perfunctory clapping, even the few who’d burst into tears. She felt like a fading star, shuttling aimlessly through space, with every reluctant step toward the queen, who awaited her with outstretched arms. At last, Lucie approached the woman, her breath gone from her lungs the moment they embraced.
Was this really happening? Why had she been chosen? Lucie hadn’t considered herself fit for the younger prince, no less the elder. A baron was the lowest rung of nobility. It wasn’t as if her dowry or standing could contribute anything of value to the Straussens.
Over the queen’s brocaded shoulder, Lucie cast one impulsive, terrified glance at the head table. This time, her eyes connected with Geo. With a look of utter devastation and disgust, the man clenched his chin and gave a single, hardly perceptible shake of his ashen head.
Lucie’s heart plummeted. Why, she’d led him to believe that she had been regularly intimate with her betrothed behind his back. The prince thought she’d betrayed him with his own brother!
The queen planted a soft kiss on her brow. “Congratulations, Luccia. Welcome to our family.”
The young woman felt ill, the meal and wine she’d just consumed threatening to resurface. Desperate, she turned again to the head table. But Geo was gone.
GEO STORMED INTO THE DESERTED courtyard. A flock of sparrows took off before him, clearly startled by his inelegant arrival, but he barely noticed them as he fought to recapture his breath.
So, Lucie’s alternate lover had been his brother? Shocked, he gripped the back of a wooden bench. Why, the ruthless girl had played both princes. No doubt she’d hoped her scheme would ultimately land her a royal title. And somehow, it had!
Geo wondered how he was to live with himself henceforth, having known his own brother’s bride in the carnal sense. Surely, Dmitri knew not of her duplicity? And why would Lucie ever tell him? The Crown Prince was clearly the choice partner for an aspiring queen.
His fingers sweat against the wood. He forced himself to let go, and beat his fist upon a limestone column instead. Dmitri. How in the blazes had mild, meek, bookish Dmitri landed an exotic minx like Luccia Camerlane and managed to keep it secret? Geo was entirely taken aback. He never would have s
uspected that his only sibling, who squandered so many hours locked alone in his study poring over old poems, possessed any firsthand knowledge of women.
The prince paused, pondering this. Regardless of his broken heart and Lucie’s irrefutable profession, something still wasn’t adding up. The polite yet thoroughly blank expression on Dmitri’s face when he beheld Lucie that evening appeared as though he’d never seen the girl before in his life.
Well, the two enacted a convincing charade, Geo decided, peering out to the northern hills. The moon was making her fickle debut, peeking dimly over the treetops, only to disappear again behind a tuft of cloud. Geo squinted, catching shapes weaving down the distant hills. Little black figures were scattered among the terrain, yet moved rapidly in apparent formation. He rubbed his eyes. Did the early stars trick him?
Alas, the shapes were real. And they only encroached closer by the moment. Were these more guests, he wondered, coming to join the festivities? It was too late for additional guests. And there were too many, pacing far too quickly.
The prince’s pulse galloped in time with the powerful steeds he could now make out. Abandoning further thought, he fled, boots pounding against the soil as he sprinted back to the banquet. With every step, he was losing time, precious time. Why had he retreated so far away?
He returned to the lawn where the royal and noble families continued celebrating into the oncoming night. Sir Kellan was the first to greet him, appearing on the verge of inquiring of his whereabouts, until he registered the look on Geo’s face.
No words needed to be exchanged. Kellan stepped out of the way, allowing Geo to access the king, who reclined at the table, listening to a ballad sung by the bard. “Father.” Geo brought his lips to the man’s ear, clasping a hand over his velvet-padded shoulder. “They are coming.”
Discreetly, King Marco Straussen lifted his bald, crowned head. “You’re sure?”
“I saw them with my own eyes.”
More knights came up behind them. “Who?” they asked.
“Llewesians.” The word was bitter on Geo’s tongue. “A whole army.”
The king lowered his glistening forehead into his hand.
“Sire?” Sir Roc’s eyes were wide with concern. “At your command….”
Geo glanced over at Dmitri, who was still seated. Their mother was elsewhere, parading Lucie about as she mingled with the guests, no one any the wiser. In spite of everything, he was sorry his brother’s evening was about to be interrupted, if not gravely spoiled.
The king heaved a defeated sigh. “Order guards to every post. Men, don your armor. The banquet shall conclude—”
A battle cry rippled through the air. Geo sucked in a breath of surprise, backing into the table as those seated shot to their feet. He’d been too late. Foreign bugles rang a horrific tune, and the whinnying of invading horses was imminent.
The Llewesian soldiers stormed in, knocking down a Tybirian flag, their horses trampling the Straussen crest beneath muddy hooves. Women shrieked and ran. Geo could hardly hear as his father and the knights bellowed orders for the guests to flee or hide.
The prince gripped the hilt of the rapier at his belt, already regretting that he’d not thought to arm himself properly for the evening. The rapier was mostly ceremonial, a costume piece. He’d never actually used it in battle. But it would have to suffice.
The riders destroyed everything as they invaded, slashing swords through the fine linens, china crashing to the ground and shattering as guests clamored to escape. Geo charged, slicing his weapon at a foreign horseman and attempting to knock him from the creature. Alas, he succeeded only in slitting the man’s thigh.
“Straussen,” bawled a deep, mournful voice. The sound chilled Geo’s blood. He raised his head to the figure seated atop a frightful black steed, and beheld a familiar drooping visage. His hooded eyes appeared not to have seen sleep in moons. His face alone was the pinnacle of madness.
“Ira.” Geo’s father spoke in a firm reprimand. “Cease this brutality.” The Tybirian knights encircled their ruler, who stood confronting the mad King of Llewes. Protectively, they raised their swords.
“You.” Spittle dripped from the King of Llewes’s bearded lips as he pointed an accusing finger, but it was not aimed at the Tybirian king. Geo followed the Llewesians’ hateful gazes to discover them directed at Dmitri. “You took him from me,” Ira growled. “My only son. My heir. All I had left of my late wife—!”
“The Crown Prince never intended to kill your son,” snarled Sir Kellan, glaring up at the Llewesian king. Dmitri remained frozen in place. “It’s not his fault your boy snuck into battle. Even your own men were unaware—”
The Llewesians lunged forward. Geo bolted before Sir Kellan, whom he thought they were after, and thrust out his rapier to defend the knight. But he was too late in realizing that they had instead gone for Dmitri.
Geo cried out, aghast as multiple gloved hands hoisted up his brother and tossed him onto a horse. The queen screamed. Geo, the king and all of their knights launched after them as Dmitri struggled to fight back. A sword posed threateningly against the Crown Prince’s throat silenced him.
Slashing a cluster of retreating soldiers with his rapier, Geo linked eyes with his brother, and took in the man’s expression of defeat. “Dmitri,” he cried, as the Llewesians rode away at top speed. He chased them as far as he could, his companions valiantly tailing him.
But the enemy horses were inevitably faster. Lungs aflame and burning for air, Geo finally stopped at the castle’s outskirts, watching them disappear up the far hills. “No,” he roared, slamming his weak weapon down onto the grass.
Sir Roc braced a hand on his shoulder, panting. “We’ll continue after them, Your Highness. We’ll fetch the horses.”
“No,” Geo growled again, swiveling around in fury. “We’ve lost too many of you already.” He winced, the faces of his fallen friends—Sirs Aidan, Kieran, Will and the others—flashing through his thoughts in rapid succession. Muscles tensed, he raced back to the banquet, where young women stooped over the wreckage, sobbing in terror, and the queen fretted inconsolably among her ladies.
King Marco paced the lawn beneath the swelling moon, speaking frantically with his soldiers. “Father.” Geo approached him, his voice wrung with exertion.
The king held out a hand. “Not now, Georome; we are strategizing.”
“Let me go after him.” Geo swallowed. “Myself.”
The knights paused, turning their heads to gawk at him.
“I know I can rescue him,” Geo went on. “We need not engage our men. So long as I’ve my bow and arrows….”
“Geo?” His mother approached, looking shaken, eyes gleaming with tears. “What is this talk?”
“Sheer rubbish,” muttered Sir Corcoran insolently.
Geo disregarded them, speaking only to the king. “Father, I beseech you. If our whole cavalry follows, there will be more war, more bloodshed, more deaths among our knights, whose numbers are already dwindling as is.”
His father connected their gazes, listening.
I’ve already lost too many friends, Geo wanted to say, but his voice threatened to crack. He cleared it. “Keep our men here, to defend the home-front from any additional attacks that may ensue, and let me retrieve Dmitri on my own. I know I can do it.”
“Absolutely out of the question,” his mother cried. “You aren’t actually considering it, Marco?”
The king remained pensive, while his knights could only watch in silence.
Geo exchanged stares with his father, until he recognized the pain behind the older man’s eyes. “You, too, are weary of the endless, fruitless battle against Llewes,” the prince whispered, testing his guess. “Well, parading our soldiers over their borders with gaudy fanfare will most assuredly guarantee more captures and deathly conflict. And it won’t help Dmitri.
&
nbsp; “At least alone, I retain the advantage of stealth. Father, you know I’m as good a warrior as any,” he appealed. “I am up for the challenge. I won’t fail my own brother.”
At last, the king inclined his chin. “Make haste, then, Georome,” he commanded.
LUCIE CLIMBED OUT FROM BENEATH the table, under which her father had implored her to hide. Squinting through the newfound darkness, her breaths shallow as she scanned the scenery, she discovered the lawn in shambles. Chairs were overturned, linens slit and torn, glass and china reduced to shards and rubble.
His form then struck her at once, there beneath the moonlight. She would recognize it anywhere: the rounded biceps, the breadth of those sturdy shoulders. Lucie exhaled with relief. Prince Georome was safe.
But not the other. The Crown Prince…her betrothed…was gone.
Raised voices carried to her ears. Geo’s proposal, the queen’s protests. The king gave his blessing, much to the outcry of his wife and surrounding knights, and Geo set off with mighty strides. Lucie’s mouth went dry. The king was permitting his son to embark upon the rescue mission alone?
She’d always reckoned Geo guilty of pride, but this was hubris. How could the man presume to venture through the wilderness to Llewes by himself, without a single companion to assist him, to watch his back?
Lucie fingered the purple amulet around her neck, coming to a decision. Among the scurrying shadows, she found her father. He looked alleviated to spot her in turn. “I’m safe,” she called simply, raising a hand. Saying nothing more, she dashed from the premises in pursuit of the prince.
When she caught up with him, he was rounding the grounds to the stables. “Geo!” Breathless, she clung to his side.
He ignored her, flinging open the stable doors.
“You can’t rescue him alone.”
“Says who?” Over his shoulders, he fastened a traveling cape. He went to the supply shelf, where he retrieved his bow and full quiver.
“Says me,” Lucie insisted, standing in his way.
